Kydd realised his summons to Madeira must have been in consultation with Popham, who had been naval commander in the Red Sea at that time, the occasion when a successful landing from the sea had put paid to Napoleon’s stranded Army of Egypt. Baird had been at Alexandria with them for the final scenes. It had been one of the few victories the army could boast of in the last war.
He inclined his head. ‘Ah, on the contrary, sir, that is a success-at-arms that will remain with me for ever.’
‘As it should.’
‘General Baird has a high regard for the Navy, Mr Kydd,’ Popham interposed smoothly.
‘As will be tested to the full at the Cape!’ Baird snapped.
‘The Cape, sir?’
As if to an imbecile, Baird spluttered, ‘The Cape of Good Hope, of course, man!’
The next day Popham duly sent for Kydd. ‘Some refreshment?’ he asked solicitously, beckoning to his steward in the great cabin of
Kydd was well aware of the capricious humour of his superior from their shared experience of the American inventor Robert Fulton and his submarines, but he was tired of being left so long in the dark.
However, as Popham began providing details of the enterprise he could see it was a bold, imaginative and daring stroke. In this first thrust of empire the British would move not against the French but the Dutch – to take the strategically vital colony at the very furthest tip of Africa that the Hollanders had settled as far back as 1652.
To date they had done little to antagonise the British, their interests lying more in safeguarding their Spice Islands trade to the east, but as the vessels of every nation heading for India, China and even the new land of Australia must necessarily pass close by, any stiffening of attitude would cause catastrophic harm.
It had been resolved that the situation could not be suffered to continue. The British would seize the Cape so that in any further thrust for empire they would be sitting squarely astride the trade routes of the world.
It was easier said than done. The Dutch were a proud people and could be counted on to resist. An opposed landing on a hostile shore all of seven thousand miles from home would be the most ambitious warlike endeavour Britain had yet contemplated.
The enterprise had been planned and launched in great secrecy; the military transports had sailed from Cork and the naval support from other ports – it was here at Madeira that the final assembly of the fleet had been concluded. It was to be a joint army and navy operation, which was not uncommon, but with the different perspectives of these two arms of the military there was always potential for unforeseen problems.
‘What is our force, sir?’ Kydd asked.
Popham frowned. ‘Not as it will terrify the enemy,’ he muttered. ‘In a descent of this importance we are granted no ships-o’-the-line save three old sixty-fours and a contemptible fifty. For the rest we have but two frigates, a brig-sloop and a gun-brig.’
Kydd blinked, astonished. This was fewer than there had been in many minor operations he had witnessed and he felt a stir of misgiving. Was this a measure of the importance Whitehall was giving the enterprise?
With a sudden cynical insight he saw the reason: if the venture failed, as well it might, the costs would be minimal and easily explained away.
‘And for the landing?’ After his experiences in Egypt and Acre he was well aware of the difficulties facing troops attempting to establish a foothold on a fiercely defended shore.
‘Beyond our preceding gunfire support, nothing. Once landed, the army is on its own.’
‘With—’
‘Soldiers of the Seventy-first and Seventy-second Highland Regiment of Foot, the Seaforths; the Sutherlanders – that’s the Ninety-third – and the South Wales Borderers out from Egypt. For cavalry they rejoice in the Jamaica Light Dragoons. Light artillery: some, the Royal Artillery with six-pounders, providing we can get them landed. And . . . well, shall we say but two brigades in all, of some two to three thousand effectives?’
Against who knew how many troops on their home ground, easy supply lines inland and the ever-present threat of French reinforcements, it was a breathtaking assumption that at the end of a lengthy and wearying voyage they would be fit enough to stand and fight, equipped only with what they could carry with them.
‘If you’ll be frank with me, sir, can you tell me a little of the army commanders?’ It was perhaps presumptuous but Kydd knew that Popham would be open in his opinions: it was his way to allow his subordinates to know his thinking.
‘The Highlanders, a hot-blooded enough lot. Colonel Pack, a firebrand, Lieutenant Colonel the Lord Geoffrey MacDonald, Lord of the Isles – like ’em all, hungry for glory. Well led, they’ll give a good account of themselves, I believe.
‘The generals: there’s Lord Beresford, a prickly chap, second to Baird but competent enough. Yorke, with the artillery – an old-fashioned sort, stickler for the forms but brave to a fault.’
He paused. ‘Major General Baird is likeable enough – we get along. He’s shrewd, a calm thinker and sees things through. I have no doubt but if he sees a chance he’ll not hesitate to take it.’
‘And if not . . . ?’
‘He’ll not sacrifice his men, not after what he’s been through.’
‘Oh?’
‘You saw the sword he wears?’
Kydd remembered a rather outlandish and extravagantly ornamented curved Oriental weapon.
‘He seized that from the still warm body of Tippoo Sahib after Seringapatam and has worn it since. Can’t find it in me to blame him – Baird was once incarcerated by him in chains for three years, with his men of the Seventy- first, in atrocious circumstances, after being overwhelmed in battle by the man’s father. It must have been a sweet
